Western Civilization_ Volume B_ 1300 to 1815 - Jackson J. Spielvogel [94]
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CHAPTER SUMMARY
Beginning in Italy, the Renaissance was an era that rediscovered the culture of ancient Greece and Rome. It was also a time of recovery from the difficulties of the fourteenth century as well as a period of transition that witnessed a continuation of the economic, political, and social trends that had begun in the High Middle Ages.
The Renaissance was also a movement in which intellectuals and artists proclaimed a new vision of humankind and raised fundamental questions about the value and importance of the individual. The humanists or intellectuals of the age called their period (from the mid-fourteenth to the mid-sixteenth century) an age of re-birth, believing that they had restored arts and letters to new glory. Humanism was an intellectual movement based on the study of the Classical literary works of Greece and Rome. The goal of a humanist education was to produce individuals of virtue and wisdom. Civic humanism posited that the ideal citizen was not only an intellectual but also an active participant in the life of the state.
The Renaissance is perhaps best known for its artistic brilliance. Renaissance artists in Italy sought not only to persuade onlookers of the reality of the object they were portraying, but also to focus attention on human beings as “the center and measure of all things.” This new Renaissance style was developed, above all, in Florence, but at the end of the fifteenth century, Renaissance art moved into a new phase in which Rome became the new cultural center. In the works of Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, and Michelangelo, the High Renaissance ideal of beauty was convincingly portrayed.
The Renaissance in Europe was also an era of “new monarchies,” best seen in England, France, and Spain. Monarchs in these countries limited the private armies of the aristocracy, raised taxes, created professional armies, and in the process were able to reestablish the centralized power of monarchical governments. At the same time, the Renaissance popes became increasingly mired in political and temporal concerns that overshadowed their spiritual responsibilities.
Of course, the intellectuals and artists of the Renaissance wrote and painted for the upper classes, and the brilliant intellectual, cultural, and artistic accomplishments of the Renaissance were products of and for the elite. The ideas of the Renaissance did not have a broad base among the masses of the people. The Renaissance did, however, raise new questions about medieval traditions. In advocating a return to the early sources of Christianity and criticizing current religious practices, the humanists raised fundamental issues about the Catholic Church, which was still an important institution. In the sixteenth century, as we shall see in the next chapter, the intellectual renaissance of the fifteenth century gave way to a religious renaissance that touched the lives of people, including the masses, in new and profound ways.
CHAPTER TIMELINE
CHAPTER REVIEW
Upon Reflection
What was the pattern of political development in Renaissance Italy? What new political practices (statecraft) did the Italians contribute to Europe, and how were these new political practices reflected in the work of Machiavelli?
What was the relationship between Italian Renaissance humanism and Italian Renaissance art?
What impact did the policies of the Renaissance popes have on the Catholic Church?
Key Terms
Renaissance
entrepreneurs
estates
individualism
secularism
humanism
civic humanism
Neoplatonism
Hermeticism
pantheism
“new monarchies”
nepotism
Suggestions for Further Reading
GENERAL WORKS ON THE RENAISSANCE General works on the Renaissance in Europe include P. Burke, The European Renaissance: Centres and Peripheries(Oxford, 1998); M. L. King, The Renaissance in Europe(New York, 2005); J. Hale, The Civilization of Europe in